Shiny
by Tie-dyed Trickster
Summary: Yamcha's caught his first shiny, and Bulma's a little less impressed with it than she could be. (A DBZ Pokemon AU)


Bulma stared at the picture she'd just opened on her phone, the picture her pokemon trainer-in-training boyfriend had just sent her, the picture labelled 'SHINY!'

"Well?" Yamcha's voice floated up from the phone's speaker excitedly, "Isn't he cool? Just think Bulma – I've only been out here a month and I've already caught a shiny one! I told you my lucky-bug-amber worked!"

"Yamcha," Bulma said flatly, staring at the yellow shape her boyfriend was holding up proudly to the camera with a huge smile, "That's not a shiny, it's a magikarp with jaundice."

"BULMA!"

"What? It is!"

"No he's not!" Yamcha responded hotly.

"Oh, it's a _he_ , is it?" Bulma rolled her eyes, "What makes you so sure it's not a _she_?"

"I checked his barbels, duh."

" _Yamcha_!"

"What?"

" _ **Ew**_!"

"'Barbels' is the _proper_ name for a magikarp's _whiskers_ ," Yamcha said in a put-upon tone, "They're yellow, see? If they were white, Roibos would be a girl."

"Roi- oh kami, you _named_ it?" Bulma groaned, rubbing her forehead.

"Of course I did," Yamcha replied defensively, "You know my mom says that it's degrading to just call 'em by their species, and I agree with her! What did you _expect me_ to do?!"

"Sell it and try to get the worth of the pokeball you wasted on it back?" Bulma suggested, "People'll buy anything if you do it right."

"No!" Yamcha responded, sounding stubborn, "He's my first shiny – and even if he wasn't I caught him so I'm keeping him. I have a responsibility to him as a pokemon trainer now!"

" _It's a magikarp_! A stupid, useless magikarp! It can't even swim!"

"Hey, don't say that, you'll hurt his feelings!" Yamcha protested, then, sounding like he was covering the speaker of his phone with his hand partway, "Don't worry, Roibos, she's… nicer once you get to know her. Sort of."

Bulma thunked her head on her desk. _Great_ , he was _bonding_ with it. Now she was going to be known as the Pokemon Professor with the idiot boyfriend, rather than the new Professor Oak. Only one way to potentially derail this- "So, what did Tien say about him?"

There was a moment of silence, then-

"Why would Tien have said anything about him?" Yamcha asked far too casually, "He's my eternal rival, after all, not like I'd tell him anything that could give him an edge-"

"Oh _please_ ," Bulma interrupted, "You two have _literally_ known each other since you were born, and you've been best friends for most of it! I don't get why you're all 'grrr, rivals!' now!"

"That's because you're gonna be a Pokemon _Professor_ , Bulma," Yamcha said matter-of-factly, "You just don't _understand_ trainers. You can't be a trainer without a rival!"

"And yet, so many people are."

"Not _proper_ trainers."

"I dare you to say that to Mr. Bardock's face."

"Look, the point is, Tien and I are rivals now," Yamcha continued hastily, "And we're gonna battle at every opportunity and one of us'll become Pokemon League Champion, and it's gonna be _amazing_!"

"…wasn't your plan for being a trainer that you were going to 'catch all the cute ones?'"

"Cute pokemon can be tough! Scythers are cute!"

Bulma thumped her head on the desk again. "Yamcha?"

"…yes?"

"What. Did Tien. Say."

Yamcha swallowed audibly at Bulma's tone, then, in the voice of one thoroughly cowed, admitted, "He said Roibos might be an albino and I should be careful of him getting too much sun, 'cause that's something Chaotzu has to worry about. Don't worry, though!" he added hastily, "I got him some sunscreen, so he should be okay!"

Bulma closed her eyes. It was a good thing he was cute, because Kami give her strength… "What are you even going to _do with it_ , anyway?"

"Train him 'til he evolves, of course."

Bulma was silent for a moment. Then, in more serious tones, said, "Yams… even for professional trainers there's less than a one-in-a-hundred chance of getting a magikarp to evolve. That's adults who have been doing this their whole lives. You know that, right? I mean, I know you're good with pokemon, that they like you and all, but what if he _never_ evolves? What if he just stays a magikarp forever?"

"Well, then…" Yamcha hesitated, then continued more confidently, "Then we'll just be good friends instead! And he can be team mascot, so he doesn't feel left out!"

Bulma couldn't help giggling at that. Her boyfriend was a delusional idiot sometimes, but he was a _nice_ delusional idiot, and cute, and thus worth keeping. Smiling, she sat up and looked at the photo he'd sent her again – he looked so happy, holding that stupid pokemon with both arms and smiling at the camera… She paused. Looked closer. Frowned. Something was off- "Yamcha, this isn't a selfie. Did you ask _another_ random stranger to take your picture for you? Because that's still really weird and is going to get your phone stolen one day." She switched the phone off speaker and put it to her ear so she could berate him more clearly.

"I _know_ , B, you've told me a million times!" Yamcha grumbled, sounding annoyed, "And, for your information, it _wasn't_ a stranger – Ginsing took it."

Bulma choked on air. "Gin- _your eevee_?!"

"Yeah, I taught her how to work the photo function," Yamcha said proudly, "She's getting pretty good at it, aren't you, girl?" a pleased 'Eeee~!' sounded in the background.

"You taught an _eevee_ to _take photos_?! Without special equipment or anything?!"

"Yeah," Yamcha sounded a little confused, "It wasn't that hard, eevees are smart. So it was pretty-"

"Farfetch'd!"

"Oops, sorry, gotta go, B – Grenu wants some help with the soup. He's not very good at measuring the spices - feather fingers, you know. Anyway, I'll call you back later, bye!"

"Your farfetch'd is making soup…?" Bulma asked numbly as the dial tone sounded in her ear. Slowly she set the phone down and hung up on her end as well, then sat there, staring at the photo of her boyfriend that had been taken by his eevee. Who didn't even have fingers to the extent pokemon like pikachus did.

Maybe he did have what it took to be a great trainer after all.

She stood up abruptly, straightening her lab coat with resolve. If her boyfriend had what it took, then he needed a really cool pokemon to help him achieve his potential, something really cool and strong and unusual that would make him stand out for something _other_ than carting around a jaundicy magikarp. And, thanks to a sample she'd taken from that 'lucky bug amber' of his, and some machines she'd been working on in dear old dad's lab… she was going to make him something perfectly prehistorical.

OoOoOoOoO

 _Little does Bulma know that the_ _ **world**_ _is Bardock's rival. Also, scythers are adorable, fight me._

 _While I usually give Yamcha a magikarp in this crazy AU, I don't actually tend to picture it being a shiny, just a boring old magikarp that he manages to successfully train and evolve because he really loves it a lot. But then I found out that shiny magikarps are yellow, and I couldn't resist. I have this headcanon that Yamcha carries Roibos around on his back in a special harness he made for him, to try and stimulate his mind more. Also that he uses Roibos as a pillow at night, because for a fish-shaped thing covered in scales, he's surprisingly squishy. And one night he's just camping between towns, drowsing off, and says, "You know, maybe it'd be better if you didn't evolve. I like things how they are now."_

 _This is the moment Roibos decides he's going to evolve or die trying._

 _Yamcha's a decent enough pokemon trainer in the regular sense, but he's_ _ **really**_ _good at training them to do things other than battle, stuff most people just would not consider training that particular pokemon to do because, dude, it's never going to work. But then it does, and he's just standing there confused over why everyone thought it wouldn't._

 _The fun bit about this fic is that Bulma is ten or eleven, and it's_ _ **still**_ _in-character. Hands up who else can see her cloning an aerodactyl for her boyfriend at that age? (for those who haven't seen it, I did a thing a few months back on tumblr where each of the Z Gang got a legendary or super-rare pokemon for their team. Yamcha gets aerodactyl, and he gets it early because, unlike in the cartoon, this one's gonna be born a baby, and he's going to have to spend a few years raising it before he can even think about training it. He names it Erl Grei.)_


End file.
